11/25/14 - 1:00am

Holiday lighting began circa 1915

Editor: St. Augustine began lighting-up for Christmas as early as 1915. In that year some merchants in a two-block section of St. George Street strung lights across the street to celebrate the season and attract customers to their shops in the evenings. The experiment worked so well that the next year all the merchants between Cathedral and Cuna Streets (save for one Grinch) chipped in to pay for lights along the way. Unlike today’s white lights, that day’s lights shone in a variety of cheerful colors.

Editor: Robert Makin (Letters, June 20) is correct in his deduction that the name “Riberia” is an English corruption of the Spanish word “Ribera,” and that it originally referred to the white sand beach that once bordered the marshes of the San Sebastian River.

After the Civil War, the first stretch of this riverbank to be developed into a regular road ran southward from King Street and was called Mill Street for the two

As St. Augustine marks the 50th anniversary of the civil rights demonstrations of 1964, we have been reminded of the sit-in staged by Murray High School students at the Hotel Ponce de Leon in March of 1964. That brief confrontation led to mass arrests.

However, few people know that a month earlier the venerable Flagler resort hotel had already quietly hosted a racially integrated conference without incident.

Editor: In a letter to The Record Chris Williams raised the question of who suggested giving the Shell Road its modern name San Marco Avenue. He cited an unidentified newspaper clipping saying that J. A. Usina suggested the name at a meeting of property owners along the road. An earlier Record story by Marcia Lane had said that Dr. Reuben Garnett, who owned an orange grove on the road, proposed the name.

Editor: A recent letter shares “words of wisdom from President Abraham Lincoln” that begin with the sentence, “You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.” The quotation continues with other conservative bromides.